S

Question 1: In what ways does your media

product use, challenge or develop forms and

conventions of real media products?

By Findlay Young

Front Cover

Forms and Conventions of my Front Cover

For my front cover I have aimed to follow the forms and conventions of

the magazine ‘VIBE’. This magazine has been rated as one of the top

RnB magazines currently publishing. Therefore I felt that my magazine

would benefit more by following their forms and conventions. As you

can see from the two magazine covers on the right, I have chosen to

follow the layout of the magazine ‘VIBE’. I have tried to use the same

conventions of the magazine cover on the right. As the genre of my

Magazine is RnB and so is VIBE, I thought it would be good to follow

the layout of that magazine. An RnB article needs to be slick and

accurate. All things need to align, the text needs to be the right size in

order for it to look good on the cover, the image of the artist needs to

be slick, attractive and eye catching. The title needs to be bold in order

for it to catch the readers eye straight away. The Cover Lines are

intrigue the reader the most because that’s what the main article in the

magazine is about. The cover lines need to stand out. Also the name

of the Artist needs to be big and bold on the cover because then the

reader knows who the artist is and who the magazine is covering an

article on.

Forms and Conventions of My Front

Cover

Master head:

• My master head is located at the top of my front cover. I have done this because people always start from the top of the

page and read down. I have put it at the top of the page because I want it to be the first thing the reader see’s. The

master head is more visible at the top rather than in the middle of the page etc.

• My master head is a different font and size to my other text because I want it to stand out and be eye catching to the

reader. The master head is the most important text on the page, therefore it needs to stand out the most. I have chosen

a recognizable font that is established with the genre of RnB.

• The master head also fills a quarter of the page so it is clear and visible to the reader.

• As you can see I have tried to follow the layout of the magazine vibe pictured in the top right. My Article master head is

a font that is recognized with RnB. My master head and the master head vibe are both behind the face/head of the

main artist.

Forms and Conventions of My Front

Cover

Head Lines:

S My Head Line is located in the bottom third of the page. I have chosen to

use the colour white because it stands out over the navy blue hoodie

that my artist is wearing. It stands out because of the contrast in the two

colours, one in bright summery colour and one is a dark winter colour.

S I have transformed the text by stretching the height of it. I have done this

to the make the text more striking on the page. I made the text taller in

height, but the same in width because I wanted the text bigger, but didn’t

want to increase the width because I did not have enough room on the

page.

S As you can see from the images on the right, my head line (Terence

Badboyrinsa) is very similar is style to the vibe one (Keri Hilson). Both of

them start on the left hand side and finish in the middle towards the right

hand side. They have been put there because people read from left to

right. Therefore as the head line is arguably the most important text,

people need to be reading that first.

Forms and Conventions of My Front

Cover

S Cover Lines:

S Cover Lines are important because they give the reader an indication of what this music magazine is going to be about. Therefore my cover lines tell the reader what this music magazine is about. For example ‘Rick Ross: “How I Dropped 100 Pounds.”’

S For my cover lines, I have made the text different colours so that they all individually stand out. I have chosen to use the colour scheme Blue, Black and Grey.

S As you can see from the images, I have tried to follow he Cover lines of VIBE. For example I have a quote from Terence BadBoyRinsa and Vibe has a quote from TI. I also have a list of people who are going to be featured in the magazine. And I have added some more cover lines than Vibe has to intrigue the reader more.

S There are also margins on either side of the page so the text does not look like it is falling off the page. The name f the artists are clear for the reader to view.

Forms and Conventions of My Front

Cover

S Selling Line:

S The selling line is typically above the master head although sometimes it is at the bottom of the page.

S I have put my selling line at the top of the page above the master head. My text is in black because it stands out against the white background which an effect on the reader because its eye catching. Also people read from the top to the bottom, so if they read “RnB’s leading Music across the Globe” they are going to be intrigued as to watch else is in the magazine.

S In the magazine Vibe, there selling line is at the top of the page of there master head. I have copied there style but I have changed the font and the colour scheme. Theirs is a white text which stands out against the black background where as mine is black text which stands out against the white background.

Contents Page

Forms and Conventions of my

Contents Page

S Features – What’s inside

S Features are used in a contents page to show the reader what page different artists are on and what that page is going to be about. For example might have a page number, the artist name and a sentence on what this page will be on.

S As for the rest of my magazine I have aimed to follow the forms and conventions of the magazine VIBE. As you can see I have tried to copy the magazine, whilst making it different at the same time. I copied the title of the features being in white writing with a dark background. I decided to go for navy instead of black but it works better for my colour scheme. With the page numbers, I have made the numbers bigger that the other text like on vibe, but I have put a navy background behind similar to features title. I have also copied the magazine by putting text under the page number and subtitle to give the reader a bit of information on what that page is about.

Forms and Conventions of My

Contents Page

S Columns:

S On my contents page, I decided to only use two

columns. I only used two columns to ensure my

contents page did not look too crowded. By using two

columns is meant I could make my contents page very

stylish and accurate with the placement of texts and

images. RnB magazines are renowned for being

accurate and slick.

S As you can see from the contents page on the right

which I have aimed to follow, they only have two

columns, one for the text and one for the images. I

thought it would be good to follow the same consider

that vibe is a renowned magazine in the RnB genre. I

also think it looks good because its stylish and not over

crowded.

Forms and Conventions of My

Contents Page

S Photos:

S On my contents page I have included an image of my cover artist with another artist. The conventions for images on a contents page is for them to not all be photos of the cover artist. They need to include photos of other artists or articles in the magazine. That is why I have included a photo of my cover artist with another artist in the photo and I have included another photo of a different artist. I have decided to make the image of my artist of the other artist the biggest because that artist is attracting the reader.

S My image is very similar to the image on the contents page of vibe., this is because the artist on that page is very similar to my cover artist and I think that the photo represents the personality of my cover artist very well.

S I have included another image on my contents page unlike the vibe one because I want there to be a difference in the two contents pages. I also think its good to have another artist on there to inform the reader of another article in the magazine.

Forms and conventions of My Contents

Page

S Page Title – ‘CONTENTS’

S The page title I used for inspiration is called ”the A-side” from the magazine vibe. I liked how it looked with the black writing over the white background. I also like it how the ‘A’ is bigger than the other letters. On my contents page I decided to switch the colour and background around. I chose for white text on a black background. I also like how the date of the magazine underneath looks on top of the black background. I decided to copy that with the date and the website of my magazine.

S I like the phrase ‘the A-side’ as the title of the contents page because it means ‘the side of a pop single regarded as the main one.’ as my magazine is called ‘DANK’ I decided to call my contents page ‘IN’DANK’ instead of the usual ‘contents page’ because a contents page tells you what’s in the magazine, therefore with my magazine, its telling the reader what is in Dank… so that is the inspiration for the name of my contents page.

S I decided to put the date of the magazine and the website of my magazine by the title it has a slight contrast with the sizes of the text. People also read from the left to the right so it is good they know what date this magazine is incase they’ve read it before.

Article

Forms and Conventions of My Article

S Photo:

S The main image on the article is usually of the artist. In my article it is Terence BadBoyRinsa as the main image. He is covering a whole page on a two page spread. He is in front of a bright blue background to make him stand out. I have also faded out an image of a skyline and put it behind my text.

S The image of Terence BadBoyRinsa is an image of him receiving a reward at the Movie Awards for ‘Best Soundtrack’. I wanted the photo to show the high points in his life rather than the low points. As the article is a biographic feature I wanted to show a positive achievement in Terence’s life.

Forms and Conventions of My Article

S Title of the Page:

S For the colours of my title, I decided to change the colour scheme I used in my front cover and contents page. This is because I wanted to brighten the page up with the blue ‘movie awards background’. The colours of a darker shade of turquoise and a brighter shade of purple went better with the blue background.

S I do not use Terence’s real name (Babarinsa) because he is known more for his nickname ‘Terence BadBoyRinsa’.

Forms and Conventions of My Article

S Article:

S The article is split into three columns to

ensure its easier for the reader to read it. It

is also easier to crate bold quotes for the

reader to see. If its not in a column it

would just be a bold line of text that

wouldn’t stand out to the reader.

S The article being in columns makes it

easier to have paragraphs and this means

the article is easier to read for the reader.

Forms

S Forms:

S The colour scheme of my magazine is Blue, Black, Grey and white. Blue and

white are typically white sophisticated colours. Black and Grey give the

magazine that gloomy/rough effect that a lot of RnB artists have had in there

rise to the top.

S I have used images that have all been taken by myself. Magazines are printed

so I have not used animations or video clips as they are not suitable.

S In my article I decided to use two different colours for the title add a brightness

to the page. I have also chosen fonts that are bold to ensure they are clear to

the reader.

Challenging Conventions

S I haven’t challenged conventions because the aim of an

RnB article is for it to be stylish, slick and cool. By following

the conventions it allows me to develop a magazine like

that. It gives me a guide line to create a slick magazine

which is what you want for an RnB magazine. All of the RnB

artists are cool and slick, and it’s the name for a magazine.

Everything has to align together to create a slick magazine.